Latest update February 16th, 2025 7:49 PM
May 17, 2019 News
Seven months after the Guyana Teachers Union [GTU]), signed an agreement with Government, through its Education Ministry, public school teachers are yet to receive duty free concessions for vehicles.
However 300 duty free concessions for vehicles were agreed upon for the educators as part of an agreement which was signed last October as part of a multi-year [2016 – 2018] salary package for public school.
“We want the process to speed up since teachers have already been waiting for seven months,” said GTU President, Mr. Mark Lyte.
He pondered on what he called the “belated announcement” from government, yesterday, that the duty free concessions were approved. According to Lyte, he was of the opinion that the concessions would have been approved by Government since last year even before the mutual signing of the agreement.
His remarks came on the heels of an official announcement from Government yesterday that 300 duty free concessions were approved for educators as part of the signed MoU.
Making the announcement yesterday was Director General attached to the Ministry of the Presidency, Mr. Joseph Harmon, during this week’s Post Cabinet press briefing.
He told media operatives that Cabinet granted its consent to the Guyana Revenue Authority [GRA] for the issuance of duty free concessions for 300 eligible senior teachers and administrators within the public school system.
The Director General said, yesterday too, that Commissioner General of GRA, Mr. Godfrey Statia, had requested Cabinet’s consent for the approval of the concessions for motor vehicles up to 1800 CC engine capacity; outboard engines of up to 75 horse power for persons in riverine areas, and ATVs for persons in the hinterland.
The eligible teachers, Harmon said, are drawn from across the 11 education districts. This has translated to 100 teachers each for the three years (2016, 2017 and 2018) with one teacher being eligible from Region One; 24 from Region Two; 58 from Region Three; 41 from Region Four; 18 from Region Five; 48 from Region Six, seven from Region Seven; two from Region Eight; three from Region Nine, 11 from Region 10; 78 from Georgetown and nine from the Cyril Potter College of Education and the Government Technical Institute.
The eligible recipients of the concessions include all heads and principals and deputy heads of Grade A and B schools; all headmasters and head mistresses of Grades C, D, and E schools after three consecutive years of their appointment and within three years of retirement.
Also eligible are senior masters and mistresses and heads of departments as well as lecturers II of the Cyril Potter College of Education [CPCE] and technocrat institutions who would have remained in the same position after their respective appointments after six years.
According to Harmon, “In granting approval, Cabinet noted the need to create a favourable working condition for teachers…[and] continues to work with GTU to improve conditions of service.”
All of the eligible teachers for the duty free concessions, according to Harmon, must be members of the GTU for no less than three years and have at least three years remaining before retirement.
Feb 16, 2025
Kaieteur Sports-Guyana’s Junior Golden Jaguars delivered a remarkable performance Friday evening, securing a 2-2 draw against Costa Rica at the Costa Rica National Stadium. The result is a...Peeping Tom… Kaieteur News- I have an uncle, Morty Finkelstein, who has the peculiar habit of remembering things with... more
By Sir Ronald Sanders Ambassador to the US and the OAS, Sir Ronald Sanders Kaieteur News-Two Executive Orders issued by U.S.... more
Freedom of speech is our core value at Kaieteur News. If the letter/e-mail you sent was not published, and you believe that its contents were not libellous, let us know, please contact us by phone or email.
Feel free to send us your comments and/or criticisms.
Contact: 624-6456; 225-8452; 225-8458; 225-8463; 225-8465; 225-8473 or 225-8491.
Or by Email: [email protected] / [email protected]